Plan To Reshape Gold Street Riles Church, Condo Owners

Rev. Damaris Whittaker sees trouble for her congregation, whose meetinghouse on Gold Street is the oldest religious institution in Hartford.

Rev. Damaris Whittaker sees trouble for her congregation, whose meetinghouse on Gold Street is the oldest religious institution in Hartford.

KENNETH R. GOSSELIN, kgosselin@courant.comThe Hartford Courant

HARTFORD — Gold Street forms a gentle, S-shaped ribbon of no more than a tenth of a mile between Main Street and Bushnell Park, past Carl Andre's Stone Field Sculpture and the gate to the final resting place of the city's founders.

Now, Hartford wants to take the street in a new direction.

For the third time since the 1890s, the city plans to reshape Gold Street so it runs along a straighter path, this time toward one of Bushnell Park's venerable brownstone gates. The vision, part of the city's iQuilt plan, would create what amounts to a linear park along the north side of a narrower, relocated Gold Street.

Moving Gold Street would extend green space from the sculpture west to Wells Street, essentially connecting Bushnell Park to Main Street. The street would swing to the south — about 100 feet at the point the street moves the most — onto city-owned land that has served as a lawn for Bushnell Tower.

The plan aims to make the area more welcoming, but that's hardly been the reception from the neighborhood.

"Look at the lower floors of our building, the balconies," Bourke G. Spellacy, president of the Bushnell Tower Condominium Association, said on a recent afternoon, walking along Gold Street. "We don't object to narrowing the street, but don't relocate it near our building. Think of the people whose units have those balconies."

Spellacy, a high-profile city attorney, said he worries about the noise and impact on property values of the tower's condominium units. He says it would make more sense to the leave the street where it is and build a walkway across the lawn to the park, contemplated when the tower, designed by I.M. Pei, was constructed in the 1970s.

Across the street, at Center Church House, the offices and community space of the First Church of Christ, the Rev. Damaris Whittaker sees trouble for her congregation, whose meetinghouse at the other end of Gold Street is the oldest religious institution in Hartford.

The new green space would be created directly in front of the church house, a hub of church and community activities, separated from the meetinghouse by the Ancient Burying Ground. Moving the street, Whittaker said, would cut off the church house, now reached easily by parking a car and crossing a sidewalk. That would make delivery of donated food and other items more difficult. The elderly and disabled would have a longer trek.

"So moving Gold Street will isolate the church house and complicate these activities getting done," Whittaker said.

Both Spellacy and Whittaker say they support iQuilt's overall mission — adopted by the city council four years ago — to make the city more walkable and inviting for city residents and visitors. IQuiltseeks to tie together cultural attractions and promote access to Bushnell Park and the riverfront. But they argue that the specific components have evolved — at one time Gold Street was going to be eliminated completely, for example — since the city council's adoption.

The church doesn't oppose iQuilt, "but we have to work on this piece," Whittaker said.

Supporters of the change to Gold Street say it is a crucial part to a 1-mile GreenWalk, the centerpiece of iQuilt. As envisioned, the greenwalk would run from the state Capitol building to the riverfront. The link along Gold Street — called "Bushnell Gardens" — would represent the first expansion of the park in 150 years.

Local corporations, such as Phoenix and Travelers, already have invested millions of dollars on early pieces of iQuilt.

"The realignment of Gold Street is imperative for the development of Bushnell Gardens and the iQuilt plan," said Jackie Mandyck, managing director of the non-profit iQuilt Partnership. "Without the realignment there would be no Bushnell Gardens, and it will compromise the overall vision of iQuilt and the GreenWalk."

Shape-Shifting Street

A century ago, Gold Street wasn't much more than an alley 15 feet wide. The street later took its name from the Colonial-era gold leafing industry that once thrived in the neighborhood. But by the 1890s, the area had developed a sordid reputation for its tenements and brothels.

The local chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution decided the neighborhood was not befitting the nearby cemetery where Thomas Hooker, founder of the Connecticut colony, and other Colonial leaders are buried.

A push by the DAR for more dignified surroundings to the cemetery — an 1897 headline in The Courant declared "Improving Gold Street: The Women of Hartford Will See It Done" — led to fundraising and the razing of a swath of buildings. Gold Street now hugged the First Church of Christ property and the entrance to the Ancient Burying Ground.

The S-shaped curve that exists today dates to the 1970s and an effort to form the four-way intersection at Main. Although this change took place about the same time as the construction of Bushnell Plaza, historians say the change was more about managing traffic from the increasing number of downtown insurance workers.

This realignment created the green space for the Stone Field Sculpture.

What is proposed under the iQuilt would keep the existing Main Street intersection and the sculpture. By narrowing Gold Street to one lane in each direction and shifting it south, the groundwork would be in place for Bushnell Gardens, planned for the future.

Under the iQuilt plan, Bushnell Gardens could become a public gathering space — perhaps with a greenhouse, a cafe, an information kiosk and a bike station. Sidewalks would be widened to better accommodate pedestrians.

Thomas E. Deller, Hartford's director of development, said the city has been working with the church, adding a couple of "drop-off" spaces on Lewis Street and incorporating some street parking near the church house. (Whittaker acknowledges those efforts, but say they don't go far enough.)

"Is it isolating or getting a new front yard?" Deller said. "It's hard to see this as isolating."

The church also worries that existing traffic backups on Lewis Street, which runs along the west side of Center Church House, would worsen with a realignment.

Tensions over the Gold Street realignment spilled over at the city council committee meeting earlier this month, packed by Bushnell Tower residents and church members. The committee was supposed to deal with the narrow issue of a relatively minor easement for the project, but the meeting turned into a wide-ranging debate on the project's merits.

"We have a lot of streets in the city of Hartford that are broken," said Louise Blalock, a Bushnell Tower resident and former head librarian at the Hartford Public Library. "Why are we spending all this money to fix a street that isn't broken?"

Part Of 'Triangle' Project

The Gold Street project is part of the city's much larger, $25 million "Intermodal Triangle Project," which is intended to dovetail with iQuilt, making the streets near the park better accommodate public transportation and cater to pedestrians.

The construction began in late March at Union Station and will cover a half-mile stretch from Union Station and major downtown streets that run off it. A $10 million federal transportation grant will cover a big part ofthe cost, plus an additional $4 million in state and federal grants. The city is picking up the remaining $11 million.

The string attached to the federal transportation grant requires that all the work be completed by September 2015, or the city could lose the grant, Deller said.

Deller said the federal grant application did not spell out the specifics of the Gold Street relocation, just that it would be moved. That could leave room for last-minute changes for the Gold Street project, he said.

It is unclear, however, if scrapping the relocation could put the entire federal grant in jeopardy, Deller said.

At the April 1 the meeting of the city council's economic development committee , member Kenneth H. Kennedy Jr. called for the city and the neighborhood to reach a compromise. In the meeting, Bushnell Tower residents argued that they had no notice that the Gold Street project was planned, but city officials said it had been discussed for years. Church members said they fear for the future of the institution.

After the meeting, Kennedy said other options — including narrowing the street where it is, making it one way or simply not relocating as close to Bushnell Tower — might be considered.

"We can accomplish the goal of creating more green space," Kennedy said. "Let's get all the options on the table. No one wants to see this plan die."